Art N' About

Author: LAUREN SMITH

Realism is making a comeback. Just wait and see. It will soon be filling the studios of countless college students who, last year, were splattering paint on mud-smeared canvases or sculpturing deformed cows out of paper mache. This artist isn't complaining. Let me tell you why realism rules.

At about this time a year ago, I received my monthly issue of ARTnews, a popular magazine with artists, collectors and curators. The magazine tends to be on top of things, so imagine my surprise when I looked at the cover and saw a sculpture of a real man's face. He didn't have green skin or missing eyes or any of the usual marks of modern art. The piece was actually a sculpture of what looked to be a real human being. Underneath this picture were the words: "A New Realism." I couldn't believe my eyes.

I read the cover article and discovered that though realism has steadfastly managed to hold its own through countless "movements" in modern art, as the new millennium began, realist artists were coming out of their studios to form what the magazine called "new realism."

This isn't your grandmother's realism with dry-looking oil portraits of stoic-faced men and rosy-cheeked women cuddling tiny dogs on their laps. The realism that is emerging is one that does draw on themes and techniques of the Old Masters while at the same time mixing and manipulating them with images from new media and popular culture.

The young painters John Currin, Elizabeth Peyton, Jenny Saville and Luc Tuymans are considered key players in the emerging realist movement. But though they create realist images, can it really be said that they practice realism? A clear-cut definition of realism is difficult to articulate, if not impossible. Saville's oil paintings of large women are indeed realistic, but there is a surreal quality to the work, perhaps because of the usually enormous scale of the paintings. Currin's work has often been criticized for its supposedly sexist depictions of women. His figures draw on stereotypes and unrealistic idealizations of women that we encounter in media. They do not look like "real" women.

Another example of not-quite-realism comes from the German artist Gerhard Richter. He was perhaps practicing "new" realism before the term even existed. In the 1970s, Richter began to use images from supposedly straightforward news and advertising photographs in his photo-realistic paintings. The images are haunting. At a time when American realists were practicing a straightforward approach, Richter produced "photo-paintings" that left the viewer wondering why such a realistic, mundane image was so disturbing. Yes, Richter was a realist, but he went beyond your clear-cut realism to depict something realistic yet at the same time poetic.

Realism is often criticized by "with it" college students who think painting or sculpting real-life is boring or that it has "already been done." Realism, even photo-realism, has an important place in the history of modern art that is often overlooked, especially in college classrooms. Hopefully, with the recent emergence of trendy realist artists like Saville and Peyton, realism will begin to be considered cool and some of us can stop throwing elephant-dung on the floor and calling it art. Realism isn't for everybody, but it should have a respected position among modern art, even for us young, hip people.